


Deadlocked

by St0rybr00ke



Category: Original Work
Genre: Abuse, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Angels, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Britain, Child Abuse, Death, Demons, Depression, Drowning, F/M, Ghosts, Graphic Description of Corpses, Hell, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Kidnapping, Loss, M/M, Macabre, Miscarriage, Murder, Murder Husbands, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Past Child Abuse, Period Typical Attitudes, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism, Period-Typical Sexism, Pirates, Postpartum Depression, Pregnancy, Purgatory, Redemption, Spain, Stockholm Syndrome, Suicide, Suicide Attempt, Suicide Notes, Supernatural Elements, spousal abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-21
Updated: 2018-04-21
Packaged: 2019-04-25 21:38:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14387646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/St0rybr00ke/pseuds/St0rybr00ke
Summary: She's young, a bit on the rounder side with kinky brown hair that bobs around her face. She's in a white dress, sleeveless and hangs loosely off her tanned frame. Her brown lips pull up into a wide grin, green eyes light up and her caramel cheeks turn rosy. She looks positively excited to lay her eyes on him. Her eyes light up with excitement and she claps her hands together in giddy glee. Something seems off about her. Edward can't quite place his finger on it. She rests her chin on a balled up fist and smirks. She seems amused at the shock she caused."You move quick for a dead man."-Edward awakens on a beach in 17th Century Cuba. A pirate, thrown overboard during a storm, he comes to and is joined by a strange woman. When she touches him he sees people after death, sees how the living will die, and the dead that remain trapped behind.





	Deadlocked

His first memory is of the ocean. He's six years of age. He's just hit a growth spurt and he's all skinny legs and twig arms. He's holding onto his father's hands. His tiny hands are barely able to wrap around his father's thick fingers. Callused palms swallow up his own baby soft hands. His bare toes dip into the sparkling ocean as he kicks and flails his bare feet and sends drops flying into the air. It's a grueling hot day and the ocean water is chilling. He's shrieking with laughter as his father lifts him up and down, up and down, feet in, feet out. The water burbles and laps up at the sandy white shore as if it had a mind of his own, an entity of it's own being. He's screeching with glee, his blond hair has loosened from its tie and has fallen around his face and shoulders. His father abruptly sets him down firmly on the sifting sand. He teeters but stands on his own. The saltwater splashes over his feet and erodes the sand beneath his feet and he sinks slowly. His father leans over and grips his tiny shoulders. He's gripping far too tightly and Edward lets out a tiny whimper and shies away. His father is tall and dark, beady green eyes settled into weathered skin, his mouth camoflouged with a wild red beard. He remembers his father's face clear as day. A scar strikes dead down the center of his face, a broken crooked nose and permanently chapped lips.   
"The ocean is a beautiful thing, Edward." His voice sounds like the sand itself under his feet, gravelly and pulling him in deeper. "But she's a fickle mistress, she turns on you at the slightest change of the wind. Bahari chooses no favorites, no man is ever in her favor. Promise me you'll never entrust your life to her, Edward. Promise me!" He screams the last two words and violently shakes Edward. The boy is trembling now, the wet sand is sucking his feet deeper. The gentle waves seem less friendly. They tug at his wobbly legs and threaten to pull him out to sea. They seem angered by his father's words and are attempting to punish him.

Edward sniffles and nods mutely. He begins to squirm and pull his feet from the sucking sand and attempts to scramble away from the ocean's edge. His father keeps a tight grip and turns him to face the ocean. Edward is forced to his knees by strong hands and he loses his balance. His hands dip into the water and he begins to wail as they too are pulled into the sand and the foam licks at his wrists. His father grips a handful of his hair and shoves his face just inches above the waters surface. As waves break on the shore salt fills his mouth and his nose. He begins to sputter and gasp, but his father's hand is unrelenting. He begins to panic and shout for his father to let him go. He rips his hands from the sand and digs his tiny nails into scarred hands as he attempts to free himself. Suddenly his father's hand increases in force and he is plunged into the ocean face first. Panicked he instinctively sucks in a lungful of air, but there is none. Ocean floods into his lungs and he suddenly cannot breathe, cannot think. Every childish thought is erased and all he can feel is warm ocean water closing around his head and sucking every ounce of oxygen out of his tiny lungs. He can't fight, he's paralyzed by the weight of it. Then suddenly he's jerked from the soft bosom of the ocean and thrown onto his back in the sand. He stares up at the sun, choking and gasping in desperation. His chest heaves and concaves as he wretches up a seemingly endless amount of saltwater. It's pouring out of his nose and his ears. It's as if it attempted to penetrate into his very being and become a part of him. He's sobbing between bouts of retching. He doesn't even realize he's wailing until his father grips a handful of his ragged shirt and drags him up to a hairs breadth away from his own face. He spits up water and it runs down his trembling chin. He's sobbing uncontrollably, but his father doesn't scold him for it this time. He looks frighteningly grim as he stares into Edward's flushed panicked face.

"Never entrust your life to her, Edward. She will spare no man, woman, or child. You may float at first, but in the end she will always make you sink. Never underestimate her, Edward. Never forget that."

He never did forget the lesson his father taught him that sunny day. He's lying on his back again, only much older. Was he wiser, perhaps not. The sun is hanging heavy above him as his dark eyes flutter open. He grunts and squeezes his eyes shut tight. He wishes to raise a hand and shield his eyes from the sun, but his body feels like lead. There's no pain yet, just an overwhelming sense of paralyzation in his limbs. The sand clings to his wet clothing, it weighs heavily on his chest and stifles him. But he's alive. Somehow freezing even still on this midsummer's day, but alive. The first chance he is able to move his fingers twitch. It's as if he's learning to walk all over again. As he's regaining feeling in his hands he hears a low moan of pain. He turns his head stiffly towards the sound and lays eyes on the source. A man dressed in a sodden red and gold trimmed uniform has apparently washed up along side him. He's wounded, Edward can see the sputtering man clutching at his chest painfully. For the time being he ignores the man and slowly forces himself to sit. The pain is still absent, in fact as he sits he feels nothing, only the invisible weight seemingly holding him down, attempting to push him back down into the hot sand. His hair has come loose from its tie and hangs haphazardly in his face and around his shoulders. Years in the sun have tinted his hair to a dark dirty blond, it hangs around a rugged face, far too worn for its years, in thin strands caked in sand and sea. The taste of the sea is heavy on his tongue, he can't seem to swallow it down. It tastes of salt and earth, of fresh open air.

He looks to the horizon with a shiver. Where his ship once stood was emptiness. He saw debris littering the beach around him; wooden planks, bits and pieces of fabric from the sail. His home is washed up here on the shore, reduced down to rubble and a few boards on the beach. His heart sinks in his chest and the chill increases. He can't seem to get warm. 

Suddenly someone is beside him. It's as if he blinks and suddenly there is a figure seated in the sand beside him. He lets out a shout of shock. Damned be the crushing weight seeming to surround him, he scrambled away across the sand faster than he had ever moved before. He lays eyes on a woman, a woman he has never seen before. She has olive skin and prominent freckles dotting her nose and cheeks. She's young, a bit on the rounder side with kinky brown hair that bobs around her face. She's in a white dress, sleeveless and hangs loosely off her tanned frame. Her brown lips pull up into a wide grin, green eyes light up and her caramel cheeks turn rosy. She looks positively excited to lay her eyes on him. Her eyes light up with excitement and she claps her hands together in giddy glee. Something seems off about her. Edward can't quite place his finger on it. She rests her chin on a balled up fist and smirks. She seems amused at the shock she caused. 

"You move quick for a dead man." She laughs, high and clear. A wind is blowing but her hair doesn't move. She looks akin to a portrait, completely still and unmoving. He cannot even tell if her chest is rising or falling with each breath she takes. Her words vex him as well. What does she mean, a dead man?   
"Where did you come from?" He asks in shock. He swears the beach was empty when he first awoke. He heard no footsteps, no sounds. She simply appeared as if out of thin air.   
The woman just keeps smiling ecstatically.

"I've been here since before you woke up. I just didn't let you see me." She chirps, seemingly unfazed at the fact she's nearly given him a heart attack. But oddly enough his heart is not pounding in his chest from adrenaline. He looks around the beach. The closest place to hide would be at the edge of the woods nearly half a mile away. The beach is flat and open, no place to shield yourself from sight and appear so quickly. He looks back to the girl and she's sitting there with the same wide smile and glowing face.

"So how did you get here?" She asks inquisitively. She cocks her head to the side with a curious look blooming in a sea of malachite. Upon closer examination he sees her right eye is actually a lighter shade of green than her left, with heavy intonations of sorrel brown. Her left eye is a pure glowing shade of sparkling green. As he looks closer he spots more. On her arms are patches of white skin that splotch her brown complexion, none on her face. They appear to stop at the neck. He realizes he's been staring for some time and the silence that hangs thick suddenly becomes awkward. He tears his eyes away and looks back out to the lapping waves. White foam dissolves on the hot sand and the waves retreat, pulling sand along with it back to the deep blue.

"There was a storm. Our ship was damaged preceding, I believe the storm destroyed it." He's elusive with the factual truth. What he speaks is not a lie, simply omission of the entirety. He looks back to the woman and she is gazing at him thoughtfully.

"You were thrown overboard?"

He answers her question with a curt nod. His mind suddenly is filled with images of what appears to be a memory he has no clear recollection of. He sees glimpses and flashes in his mind. A storm appearing out of seemingly thin air. He's falling over the side. He slams into the ocean and feels every ounce of breath knocked out of his body. He's sinking, surrounded, and the familiar feeling of powerlessness and horror reminiscent of his childhood fills him. A pit of dread in his stomach as he is paralyzed with fear, sinking ever slowly into the deep pit of the ocean. He is suffocating, a horrible feeling as he begins to see black creeping into the edges of his vision. 

"Did you pray?" Her voice interrupts his thoughts and he jolts as if shaken awake by a firm hand. He arches a brow in confusion. The woman proves to vex him further.

"I asked, did you pray? When you were thrown overboard?" Edward scoffs at this.

"I'm not a particularly religious man."

"It's not what I asked you, is it?" She fires back practically before the words even leave his mouth. He's beginning to grow frustrated with this. Edward needs to find civilization, a ship to charter. He needs to rebuild from the ground up. He has no time to spend sitting on a beach having the most intimate conversation he's had in years with a strange woman who just appeared. He ignores her and forces himself to stand. His body feels odd. Every movement feels foreign and forced. His body does not feel his own, he's uncomfortable in his own skin. The woman remains seated and turns her head away from him. She gazes back out to the sea with the softest hint of a smile on her lips. She looks almost saddened, forlorn perhaps a better word.

"You ought to check your pulse." She speaks quietly. Edward looks at her in utter bewilderment. 

"I am moving, am I not? I do believe I would notice if I didn't have a pulse." Bitingly he responds as he begins to storm across the sand. There has to be a town somewhere nearby. Perhaps she's just the town loon and has set her sights on him. He looks to the sand, his steps don't feel as weighted as they should be.

"Look at the man lying there." Her voice returns and he spins around to see she's right behind him. In the shock of her appearance he has almost forgotten the man lying on the beach. He's no longer making sound, but his sharp eyes pick up on the distinct rise and fall of his chest.

"What of him? He's done for. There's nothing I can do to help him." Edward becomes defensive, assuming her words to be an accusation. The woman instead smiles and shakes her head. She looks at him as if her were a child.

"You're right. He's going to die here. Very soon, I would say in two minutes." Her words hold a definitive certainty that send chills down his spine. "But look closer." She suddenly grabs his hand and the feeling of suffocation returns. His hearing becomes muffled and he feels the familiar dragging sensation. He's floored to the sand where he stands. As soon as her skin touches his he sees the man lying as he is now, but he is much more decayed. His eyes are bulging and staring vacantly. The skin has receded away from the sockets and he is mere skin and bones. The flesh has begun to rot and disintegrate away, chunks are missing presumably from where birds and animals have begun to pick at his flesh. His uniform has begun to degrade and fall apart. He feels the woman slip her hand away, it feels as if it happens in slow motion. As soon as her skin leaves his own everything returns to normal in the blink of an eye. The sound is normal, the man is lying there still motionless, but whole and intact. Edward feels absolutely sickened to his stomach and he looks at the woman in revulsion.

"You're a witch." There can be no other possibility. She shakes her head in amusement at the accusation, her tight curls bobbing. Edward turns and begins to storm away from her towards the woods. There has to be a village nearby. He feels a desperate need to put as much distance possible between himself and this occultist.

"I am no such thing. I am like you. I'm dead." She speaks casually, reappearing by his side. Edward scrambles away from her. He's barely made it ten steps and she's right beside him already. 

"Do you think I'm a dunce?! I am standing here talking to you, moving about, pray tell me just how you think I am dead?!" He shouts, he finally loses his temper, something he typically does not do to women, but this devil had pushed him too far. She barely bats an eye, she instead stands there with a calmly sympathetic smile.

"You're not completely like me. You're dead, but only your body. Your spirit is still within you." She speaks serenely, as if her words make perfect sense. He can only shake his head in complete and utter disbelief. She has to be absolutely mad. Edward cannot seem to come up with a reply, so he simply turns and continues to take long strides away from the woman.

"Put your hand over your heart if you don't believe me." She insists. She somehow keeps up with him as he half runs half walks towards the sprawling jungle. There has to be a trail, a port somewhere. 

"Leave me, before you regret it." He growls. He feels a small hand on his jacket sleeve, tugging at him before he can keep walking. On instinct his hand flies to his pistol holstered in the leather belt wrapped around his waist. In the blink of an eye he's facing her with the barrel to her head and his bejeweled finger hovering over the trigger. She barely bats an eye, she doesn't even look frightened.

"I'm not lying to you. I promise you." She is solemn now. Without thinking he pulls the hammer back with a click and presses on the trigger. The hammer flies forward and snaps back into place. Nothing follows.

"Fuck!" He throws the gun aside in a rage, watching it disappear into the overgrowth of green plant life. The gunpowder was soaked. The gun is useless. The woman grabs his arm suddenly and with a shocking amount of strength for a woman, forces him to bend his arm and place his hand over the left side of his chest. 

"Feel it, don't you feel nothing?!" She cries out insistently. Edward freezes for a moment. He suddenly pulls his arm away and slides his hand under his navy blue coat and thin white shirt to rest against his bare skin. His flesh is ice cold to the touch, the sun has done nothing to warm him. He presses his palm firmly into his chest and holds absolutely still. His initial fear was confirmed. Nothing beats beneath his skin. He looks at the woman in horror, his stomach churning sickeningly. She smiles sympathetically at him, her gaze soft and kind.

"My name is Bianca. Perhaps we should find somewhere to sit and talk."


End file.
